MEET – A decade after Christopher Nolan’s trilogy, Robert Pattinson wears a harsh version of the vigilante, “a reflection of our world on the verge of implosion”. Confidences of producer Dylan Clark and comedian Andy Serkis while waiting for the theatrical release on March 2.
“Being entrusted with the fate of Batman is terrifically exciting and deeply terrifying. Matt blacked out a lot of notebooks to find a common thread that justified going back., admits Dylan Clark. A decade after Christopher Nolan’s cult trilogy, just a few years after the film failures Justice League and batman vs. superman of Zack Snyder, the producer supported his friend Matt Reeves to give life to The Batman, reinterpretation of the vigilante of Gotham, under the tormented features of Robert Pattinson. While waiting for its theatrical release on March 2, Le Figaro was able to converse with Dylan Clark and Andy Serkis who lends his bills to the faithful butler Alfred Pennyworth.
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Already at the helm of the new saga The Planet of the Apes, the duo Dylan Clark and Matt Reeves know about rereading myth. Their first requirement:sign a Batman film different from those that preceded it, with new emotional stakes”. Exit then “the story of origins”. The murder of his parents is central but never shown on screen.
Nor is he the flamboyant playboy glimpsed under Nolan’s pen. “The Bruce Wayne of Matt Reeves and Robert Pattinson is not yet the symbol of justice and hope that he will become. He is shaken. We put it upside down. He wonders about the legacy left by his parents. The truths they took for granted may not be. points Dylan Clark. His batman armor is still fresh. “He is not yet an expert. He did not exorcise the pain and the rage caused by the disappearance of his family. Fixing the flaws in Gotham is not a mission but an enforceable”.
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Between film noir and thriller
This dull anger corrodes even the bond between Bruce Wayne and his faithful butler Alfred Pennyworth, camped by the cult actor of Matt Reeves, Andy Serkis. The comedian “found in The Batman concern around filiation which already formed the heart of The Planet of the Apes and tapped his Caesar ape character“. And to specify: “You are going to discover a Bruce Wayne and an Alfred at loggerheads. Alfred is racked with guilt for failing to protect Bruce’s parents and not being a worthy surrogate father. As a good mentor, he trained him in combat techniques but does not approve of his activities as a vindicator..
The aesthetics of The Batman had to be in tune with this challenge of renewal. Matt Reeves and Dylan Clark quote Metropolis as a central influence, just like Taxi Driver and Chinatown. “We plunged back into the classics of film noir but not only. We watched documentaries, especially about serial killers. Because it is the psychological mechanisms that form the personality that interested us.remembers the producer.
On screen, as the trailer and poster suggest, the shades of red and black multiply endlessly. The Batman which even pulls towards the almost detective thriller weaves a contemporary atmosphere and keeps its feet on the ground. “We wanted this Gotham of concrete and skyscrapers to be authentic. That our actors really interact with this environment”. This resulted in sometimes daunting filming conditions like early morning scenes in freezing rain in Liverpool: “Robert Pattinson and Zoë Kravitz who plays an equally novice Catwoman chattered”.
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A Gotham “mined by tribalism”
This vision of a Gotham “on the verge of implosion, undermined by tribalism” is also a way to place a magnifying glass “on what goes wrong in our society and to see this hero so imperfect prowling in a city that is just as much”, diagnosis Dylan Clark. “The Batman shows the ramifications of a world under the sign of isolation, division, fragmentation. We are moving further and further away when we should unite in the face of current threats such as climate change, the pandemic…”, plus silk Andy Serkis. And to conclude: “Like Hamlet or Macbeth, each generation needs its iteration of Batman and reinterprets it in light of the challenges they face.”
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